Help
by Svartvinge
Summary: " 'Well… I guess things could've been worse.' Robin grinned slightly, just a bit loopily, to himself in an attempt to relieve the tension and fear that had settled in the pit of his stomach."


**My first YJ fanfic, whoot! I've wanted to write one for ages now, but laziness and procrastination prevented me from doing it. Oh well. At least I've written one now though! …Whether that's good or bad, I'll let you decide. In any case, I hope you'll enjoy it. If there are any mistakes, it's probably because it's about 1 AM right now here, I'm tired and should've gone to bed about two hours ago, but I couldn't. Not until I got this part done, anyway. But I'll upload it anyway, with or without mistakes, and check it more thoroughly tomorrow. Because I'm badass like that. …Or just lazy.**

**Disclaimer: I own nothing. …Sadly. **

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"Well… I guess things could've been worse." Robin grinned slightly, just a bit loopily, to himself in an attempt to relieve the tension and fear that had settled in the pit of his stomach. He carefully, slowly, _painfully _shifted and started making his way forward again, but fell back to his knees once more with a hiss of pain escaping his lips as his arm wrapped itself tighter around his abdomen. Exactly how it could've been worse, he didn't know right now. But he tried not to think of that. Had to keep his hopes up. Though it proved to be difficult as his vision almost seemed to tilt slightly and blur even further. The warm liquid seeping through his fingers clutched over the wound in his stomach didn't help either. And neither did the fire behind him that slowly but steadily were growing in size. It would only be a matter of time before he either bled to death, suffocated from the smoke, burned or just simply fell and hit his head on one of the sharp corners of those damn crates in another attempt to walk out of there. Now that would just be an embarrassing way to go. _God… Batman would be so disappointed if he could see me now…_

He never should've even thought about going on patrol solo. Much less with the fever he'd been having. But after two failed missions in a row with the team, one of which it was _his _fault that it had failed, he needed to do something, _anything_, to prove himself to Batman, to _Bruce. _It was stupid, he knew that. But the obvious disappointment from Bruce, the way he told him "_no_" so coldly when he had asked if he could join him on patrol earlier that night… He hated it. He couldn't take it and maybe it had a little bit to do with restoring his own pride, to show himself that he still _had it_ but whatever the reason might've been, it was just a waste of time to dwell on it now. Precious time he could use for other things. Like, oh, maybe _getting the hell out of there already!_

The smoke was getting thicker and Robin coughed harshly, the hand not wrapped around the stab wound clamping over his mouth in a futile attempt to stifle the coughs as they racked his body violently, making him cry out in pure pain as they jostled his stomach and wound. He staggered to his feet again. His eyes were tearing from the smoke, heat and maybe a little from the stabbing pain too, but if anyone asked, he was going to deny that. Vehemently. As he took a tiny, quivering step forwards, panting heavily and shakily from behind his hand, a sharp blast of pain shot through his head. A yelp, muffled by his own hand, his vision turning almost black around the edges and making it difficult to see, another two, almost blind, steps, and he fell forward. Landing on the dirty floor of the burning warehouse, a choked gasp coming from his now dry and chapped lips as his stomach started doing some rather impressive acrobatics that he wasn't sure even he himself would be able to copy later. If there was a later for him, that is.

He had sprained his ankle when he had landed wrong after doing a flip to avoid a crowbar to the head. Bruce would've probably given him one of his "I know you could've avoided that _and _not gotten yourself injured because honestly you've done more complex acrobatics than that, but obviously you're not acting like yourself tonight and I hope you're alright but I won't ask you that 'cause I'm the goddamn Batman but I will ask you later when I'm Bruce and maybe have Alfred make you some cookies when we get back from patrol"-looks if he had been there, but, obviously, he wasn't. And Robin really wished he had been. Maybe then, he would've been able to focus enough to notice that other guy sneaking up behind him, _before_ he was hit in the back of his head with a _rock _of all things. Though, to be fair, it was a pretty damn heavy and hard and _painful _rock. After that, it had all been a blur. He had done his best to keep fighting, though with what he now suspected was a concussion, a bad one at that, and the fever that just refused to leave him alone, making his body weaker than he felt comfortable with, it was almost inevitable that he was unable to keep dodging every hit for long. And once they had managed to slow him down enough, gotten close enough… Robin hadn't even seen the knife, before it was suddenly embedded in his gut to the hilt. _So stupid… So, so stupid! _

After they'd beaten him, destroyed his communicator and stolen his utility belt (probably to sell it at the black market, what did he know) and lit the warehouse on fire, most probably to get rid of any evidence or fingerprints that had been left by them, the drug dealers had left. Thankfully. They hadn't had any other people with them, hostages, buyers or addicts, so that meant Robin was the only one left in the building. Whether that was a good thing or not, he wasn't sure of at the moment. But at least, if it came to that, no one but him would di-

Robin's throat tightened and he tried to swallow the sudden lump that had formed. His eyes burned, both from the heat and unshed tears. He blinked, once, twice, and the tears fell, making a wet trail down his dirty and bloody cheeks, followed by a raspy, fearful breath and a weak, barely audible sob. But as soon as the sound of it reached his own ears, he quickly, or as quickly as he could in this weak and feverish state, lifted his head from the floor and scrubbed at his eyes. _Get a grip. You're not dead. Get up and get out. You're the goddamn Robin, damn it! _Those thoughts were enough to make him slowly push himself up, groaning quietly, and onto all fours. He didn't dare to get to his feet again. The smoke would make it impossible to breathe, so it would be better to stay close to the ground. The heat wasn't as bad here either. And if he fell again… Robin wasn't sure he would be able to get back up. He had already lost so much blood and combining that with the fever and the beating he had taken, it had been a miracle that he had been able to stand earlier at all.

A sudden creaking sound from above made him pause and he slowly turned his head upwards. Narrowing his blue eyes through the mask in an attempt to see through the thick, black smoke, trying to find the source of the sound. Though it was made even more difficult with his already blurry vision. But whatever that sound was…and he had a good suspicion on what it could be…it wasn't good. And meant he had to get out. Now. And fast. He turned his gaze back down and straight ahead and slowly started crawling. A sharp stab of pain shot through his stomach at every movement and he winced and bit his lower lip hard in an attempt to ignore it, even as he felt the blood seep out of him, drop by drop, and onto the floor, making a rather macabre trail behind him as he crawled forward. He was praying that the knife hadn't hit any vital organs, but right now, he wasn't sure that whoever was up there was listening to him.

Suddenly, smoke and heat filled his lungs and Robin coughed, violently and helplessly, tears streaming down his cheeks now as he was unable to stop himself. He stopped crawling and clamped a hand over his mouth again, but it did little to nothing to help. He couldn't breathe. His body was shaking and his stomach hurt. Everything hurt. It hurt! _Please, just stop! _After what seemed like ages, the coughing finally subsided and as soon as it did he started moving forward again, but still kept the hand over his mouth in an attempt to keep more smoke from entering his body.

He blinked the tears away, continuing to move at a slow pace. Too slow. _Agonizingly slow._ Right now, he really wouldn't have minded having Wally's super speed. Not that it would've made much of a difference in his current state. But still. _Wally…_ He missed Wally. He missed Bruce and Alfred and Wally. He missed the team. He wanted to get out of there and go home and eat Alfred's cookies and train with Bruce and beat Wally at video games and laugh as-

His rambled, feverish thoughts were cut short as a roaring, creaking _boom! _sounded from above and around him and suddenly, he was pinned to the ground by a burning beam and debris that had fallen from the roof just above him as the ceiling of the warehouse collapsed. He couldn't move. It hurt. He could barely see anything at all. It was hot, he couldn't breathe and everything just _hurt._ He had to get out. Get help. He was getting weaker, his being conscious a pure miracle, or maybe a curse, and his breath was coming out in broken pants, short and raspy, but it wasn't enough to get any oxygen into his lungs and he just _wanted to go home. _

"Help…" was all he managed to whimper, before the darkness that previously just played around the edges of his eyes shrouded his vision completely.

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**Note that any rambling in this story is mostly because of Robin's concussion. *nodnod* At least, that's the way I tried to write it. I might be evil and just leave this as a one-shot and leave the ending up to you, or I might decide to write a second chapter or more to it. It all depends whether I get my lazy butt into gear and write it down, 'cause I kind of do have some sort of idea of where I might take it. We'll see. **


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